Poetry Town

POETRY TOWN is a collection of 80 poems on nostalgia, love of beauty, and appreciation of the nature. His concerns for the fate of humanity, the down-trodden, and the oppressed people in the Middle East are converted into lyrical poems. One his favorite metaphor is lover substituted for patriots. Bejan Baran is an Iranian-American poet and critic. He has published 6 books of poetry and literary criticism in English and Persian: Road & River, Western Diwan, Eastern Diwan, Four Seasons and Rain's Journey. His poems and articles on poetic processes are published in World Literature Today and Iranian Web sites. He has translated into English, Iranian New poems by Nima Yushij (1895-1958), Ahmad Shamlu (1925-2000), Mehdi Akhavan (1928-1990), Forough Farrokhzad (1935-1967). In literary criticism, he discards the traditional periodization of Iranian literature on the basis of monarchical dynasties; opts for literary styles to anchor poets or poems in history. He thinks: Poetry is the capture of the transient moment in an eternal expression for education, pleasure, and history. As Hafez of 14th century said, poetry is the "recording in the World's chronicle;" a moment that repeats itself whenever a reader looks at the poem. Baran's poetry is a bridge between the present and the past. The past includes his childhood, his long Iranian culture, and his youth studying in the West. He is a lyrical poet, whose work has been frequently published in the literary sites in Iran, North America, and Europe. His poetry is based on love imagery, full of memories of the bygone days in the motherland. The rhythm in his poetry reverts to the syllabic meters of oral, folkloric and ancient poetry, in contrast to the Near Eastern quantitative and qualitative metrics, adapted by the medieval Persian poets. This is also different from English rhythm of accented and unaccented syllables organized into feet, aka patterns. His language is rich with alliteration, rhyme, and visual description. His poetry evokes all 5 senses. He has a special affinity for the environment. Currently he is researching the relationship between the brain and the poetic creativity; sections are being published in various Iranian, Afghan, and Western Web sites. Background and education Dr. Baran was born in Tehran, Iran; traveled extensively throughout the ancient plateau, all European countries, some North African cities, and most US states. Museums, cities, and natural spots were his favorite stops. He noticed similarities in the vegetation around the world. In climbing Tuchal heights in Northern Tehran on weekends, once he found a calcite fossil of a fish the size of a palm; later, in the West, he read about the contiguity of the continents under the super-continent Pangaea and the single Sarmatic Sea which covered Caspian, Azov, Aral and Black Seas as the remnants of the evaporated basin. Web search is his choice of accessing the human knowledge around the globe and throughout the history. He has a PhD, MS, and BS in Electrical Engineering and an MS in Nuclear Engineering all from University of Missouri, Columbia.